My Christmas Reflection

A few nights ago, I had the opportunity to understand what the first Christmas was like from a different perspective.  We had been participating in Posadas through the parish.  It´s a really cool tradition that they do here, along with most of the rest of Latin America for the nine nights before Christmas.  Two people dress up as Mary and Joseph and they walk through the streets with a group of people singing Christmas carols until they find refuge at a home.  Once they get there they are welcomed by the family and a reflection is provided and food is shared. 

Last Thursday, the people who were supposed to be Mary and Joseph ended up having something come up and somehow at the last moment I was asked to be Mary.  So I stuffed a stuffed animal under my shirt and put on a blue sheet and we started on our way to the first house.  So here I was, unexpectedly having had this responsibility somewhat thrust upon me, already completely exhausted after a long day, making my way on foot to Bethlehem.  It was a very long walk to the first house, and we already had a late start, so it was pretty late by the time we got there, but the family that lived there was very welcoming.  We sang a few songs and listened to a reflection on the Annnciation story led by my community mate Greg.  He talked about the uncertainty Mary must have felt when she was approached by the angel, but how in the end she had the faith to go throught with God´s plan for her, no matter how scary it was or how unworthy she felt.  He challenged us to be strong and faith like Mary this Christmas season. 

After some food we continued on our way.  I didn´t know it until then, but the next house was literally all the way across town, and it was already late and we had walked a long ways already.  I had absolutely no energy left and I just wanted to go home, but giving up at this point was really not an option.  So we trekked all the way across Monte Sinaí again.  My feet hurt and the sheet wasn´t staying on my head well and it was so hot out and I was hungry and I just wanted to go home.  The second house welcomed us and we sang more songs and Greg did another reflection similar to the last one.  As I sat there wishing I could just go home, but at the same time appreciating the hospitality of the family who had welcomed us into their home and listened to the reflection, I realized that I understood the Christmas story from a different perspective after this experience.  Mary was just a girl who was asked out of nowhere to do something that she didn´t ask for and that wasn´t easy, but she said yes.  And as much as we sing about and talk about what a beautiful, peaceful, holy, silent night that firsty Christmas was, that probably wasn´t how Mary would have characterized it at the time.  She was nine months pregnant and sitting on a donkey all the way to Bethlehem.  She probably wanted nothing more than to just go home to Nazareth and sleep in her own bed.  But no matter how exhausting and frustrating that night may have been for her, it was also a beautiful, peaceful, holy, silent night for the world because that was the night that God came into our world in the form of a baby boy. 

Sometimes we have to go through the ugly and the exhausting and the crazy to get to the beautiful, and sometimes we may wonder ¨why me¨and just want to go home and have a good meal and go to bed, but if I´ve learned anything in my time in Ecuador so far, it´s that you just have to have the faith to say yes and work through all the difficult stuff until something beautiful comes out of it.  I´m sure that Mary would agree with me on that one, because the baby that was born on that first Christmas night went on to do some pretty amazing things.

Merry Christmas on behalf of the volunteers of Rostro de Cristo
Monte Sinaí, Ecuador 2012
From left to right: Colleen, Heidi, Mike, Greg, Ana, and Jimmy

Ya estamos en diciembre (pues… casi)

Hi friends, family, etc!  It’s been a while since I last blogged.  Sorry about that… I’ll waste no time, let’s jump right in and try to get you caught up.

So I’ve now been in Ecuador for four months, which seems like a really long time and at the same time it seems like no time at all.  I’ve completed a full trimester of teaching and now I’m a few month into another trimester.  Finals week in Ecuador was definitely an experience- just figuring out the process and how the grading system works here was an experience in itself, but also the fact that I was giving finals to six-eleven year olds is pretty crazy.

            The process of finals was basically three weeks long- there was one week just for review where each student had to do a “cuestionario” for each class which was sort of like a study guide.  Then the next week was finals week.  They have finals for every subject they take: I asked the 5^th grade teacher how many tests that meant for her students and she said fifteen.  Isn’t that crazy!  I can’t imagine having to take that many tests all at once, especially at such a young age. 

            Now that I understand the education system pretty well, I am getting pretty frustrated with the way that everything works.  In a nutshell, classes tend to be just kids copying notes into their notebooks and not very much active learning at all, parents are very involved in their kids grades and often do their homework for them, most schools teach English out of a book that is only in English including all the instructions and the teachers barely speak English so I don’t know how anyone is expected to get anything done that way- full immersion is a great idea, but you need some sort of context to actually understand things.  The focus is mostly on dictado (basically spelling) and math and they seem to not spend a ton of time on other things, and most of all, grades seem to be much more important to kids and parents than actually learning, which is very annoying for me as a teacher when my goal is to get them to learn as well as possible, and it also means that cheating on tests is very common.  That being said, San Felipe, the school that I teach at, does a relatively good job of not getting too caught up in all of these things and trying really hard to teach as well as they can.  They have a new class called “development of thinking” this year, which I don’t know a lot about but I think it is a really good step in the right direction.  And as far as English goes, we don’t use a book, but I make up all the curriculum on my own and try very hard to plan activities and assignments that will help them learn in the best way possible.  The teachers and the Madres who run the school are really great and care about the kids a lot, so all in all I’m very proud to be a part of this school, even if the education situation in this country is challenging. 

One of the things I do aside from teaching classes to try to help the kids learn is read them books.  Very few of them have books in their homes and they don’t spend a ton of time on reading in school, so I always bring a few picture books in Spanish to school every day and read to kids during recess or at the end of the day or sometimes at the end of my class.  I definitely can’t imagine having a childhood without books, so it’s important to me to help reading be a part of these kids’ lives. 

The week after finals we had a whole week of vacation, which was nice because I had some time to just spend in the neighborhood and prepare for the upcoming trimester.  At the end of that week was the first Rostro retreat of the year in Ayange.  It was a three day retreat at a retreat house near the beach for all of the Rostro volunteers during which we got time to reflect on our time so far, to pray together, talk as a community, and to have some time to spend just hanging out at the beach and getting some rest.  Needless to say, it was a great weekend.  It was fun to be on the beach with the other house of volunteers and get to enjoy some food that we don’t normally get in our communities, and the reflection and discussion was very productive and insightful. 

Here’s a picture of us on the beach on retreat!  Pictured are all of the volunteers from both communities, our in country director Darcy, and our retreat leader Amy.

Thanksgiving in Ecuador was also definitely an experience.  We were able to celebrate on the night of Thanksgiving at the school Nuevo Mundo in Guayaquil, which is a work site for some of the Rostro Volunteers who live in Arbolito.  The woman who started the school is from the United States and always hosts all the gringos she knows in the area.  There were about forty people total, including the other Rostro community and their retreat group of high school students.  It was a really nice meal and we got to eat outside, which was definitely different from Thanksgivings that I’m used to. 

The following Saturday, our community celebrated Thanksgiving again, this time at our house with us cooking, which was interesting for those in charge of the turkey.  I did the vegetables.  It was a double celebration of Thanksgiving and Ana’s birthday, and Greg’s family came over to eat with us.  It was a really great night with our Ecuadorian family and some great food. 

A few weeks ago, I started rehearsing for Christmas with a group of kids at one of the chapels that’s part of our parish.  So far we’ve had three practices and it’s been a really cool experience for me.  It’s been great to learn Christmas songs in Spanish and be able to get ready for Christmas by working with a choir.  It’s exciting for me that I get to work in music ministry in a way other than just singing at mass- hopefully I’ll have a few more opportunities to do things like this later in the year.  I’ve been pleasantly surprised by my ability to teach singing in Spanish- I thought it would be tricky trying to explain how the voice works, but for the most part I think I’ve been able to get the message across and I can tell that the kids are learning.         

            I think that’s about all.   I’ll leave you with a picture of me and our two dogs, Clubber and Nala!  Nala is our new puppy- she’s about 5 months old. 

¡Dos meses han pasado en Ecuador!

Hi Friends and Family!!

I hope this blog post finds you well.  It’s been a while since I last posted and I have a lot to cover, so I guess I’ll get right into it and start off by talking a bit about my primary placement at San Felipe. 

I have really been learning a lot at San Felipe about how to be the best teacher I can be.  I’m finally feeling like I am getting an idea of where each grade level is at with their English background and how they learn best in general, and I’m adjusting the way I teach and evaluate them every day.  It’s been a long process, but I’m starting to settle into a system that really works for me and helps them learn.  The toughest part for me in the beginning was 2nd graders: they are only about six years old and have a very short attention span, so it was really tricky for me to manage the classroom and teach them in a way that the material would stick.  The way that I knew how to teach just didn’t work for them.  But I’m definitely getting more comfortable teaching them and actually really enjoying the ways that I’ve come up with.  They are at a really cute age.

Last Wednesday, all the kids at San Felipe went on a field trip to the Circus, which is definitely worth mentioning.  It began with me and my community mate Greg, who also works at San Felipe as the computer teacher, shepherding groups of first graders about six blocks from the school to the Circus tent which I had no idea was there until we went.  The circus featured events such as dancing, an acrobat who was pretty impressive, especially considering she was held up by a pulley and two men holding the rope on the other end, a magician, a clown, and the “Hombre Flecha” (Arrow Man), who jumped through a hoop with knives sticking out of it and then a hoop that had been set on fire.  The first event that is definitely worth going into more detail about would be “The Pequeña Valeska,” which involved one of my students, a third grader at San Felipe, who is apparently in the Circus (I’m pretty sure her parents are the magician and the clown).  She did acrobatics on a rope attached to her chin which was held up by the same pulley but only held by one man.  I was sitting right underneath her as she was doing her routine and I was freaking out the whole time because it did not seem safe at all and she basically had a rope around her neck, but she’s just fine and was in my class the next day so I guess I should have been more trusting.  There was also a portion of the show where the clown made four of the teachers, including my community mate Greg, come up and dance, and it was incredibly entertaining for all. 

One part of our ministry here in RdC involves “neighborhood time” where we go and visit the people in our community and form relationships.  It´s been really fun to spend time getting to know people from Mount Sinaí.  A few notable neighbors include Monica, one of the oldest friends of Rostro de Cristo who has three kids at home and has always been like a mother to the volunteers every year that they´ve been here.  She´s really sweet and always welcomes us into our house.  Another neighbor who I´ve gotten to know pretty well is Johana, who is the fifth grade teacher at San Felipe.  I´ve been helping her get on her facebook and check her email, and I also helped her class learn a zumba dance to perform for the Olimpiadas, which was sort of like a really epic all day track and field day with parents and an intense soccer tournament.  And one of the neighbors who I´ve spent a lot of time with is Cristina, a young mom with four sons: three of whom go to San Felipe and two of whom are my students.  I taught her to make chocolate chip cookies, which turned out much better than I expected, and next on the docket is brownies and also spaghetti.  We always have lots of stuff to talk about; she studied piano at a conservatory when she was younger, so she´s teaching me music vocabulary in Spanish for when I give music classes during vacations.  I really just have a lot of fun hanging out with her.   

Another part of our lifestyle in RdC is living in community.  I live in a house with five other volunteers (Ana, Coli, Miguel, Jimmy, and Gregorio).  As part of living in Christian community, we have weekly community nights and spirituality nights.  The first cycle of community nights, we told our life stories, which was a pretty cool way to really get to know each other, and for the second cycle we´ve mostly been playing games (so far Sequence and Balderdash).  Spirituality night is a way for us to pray and reflect each week aside from our nightly prayer together, and a different person plans it each week.  It´s been really cool to experience each person´s own form of prayer and reflection.

One cool community activity that we did along with the other Rostro community this past weekend was do a house build together through the nonprofit Hogar de Cristo where some of my community mates work.  With a group of 17 in total, we helped put up two cane houses out in the country for two different families in the span of about five hours or so.  The one we built was for a man named Nativo, a rice farmer, and his wife and five kids.  It was one of the kids´ birthdays that day and they were setting up a party for him about the same time we were finishing the house.  I hope he enjoyed his birthday present!!

Here are a few pictures from the house build:

This is Nativo´s family and all of us who helped build the house.

In closing, I guess I´d just like to talk a little about how I´ve changed in the two months that I´ve been here.  I don´t feel like I´m changing a lot or that my Spanish is improving that drastically, but I know that I am changing a lot poco a poco because of all the things I´m experiencing and the people that I´ve met and the whole different world that I´ve become aware of.  The main thing that I can definitely put my finger on is the way I value my time.  I teach class at 7:30 sharp four days a week, and that means I have to go to bed pretty early, which has never been something that I have been a fan of.  But I´ve definitely settled in a schedule of waking up early, working, visiting neighbors and tutoring, and being involved in the parish in my Rostro community, which is really great.  In the US, I could spend days doing basically nothing, but here I really feel like I have a sense of mission and so much to do and so many people to see.  I definitely don´t waste my time as much as I have in the past.  I´m still working to find a balance because obviously I need to be taking time for myself to relax and take care of myself, but I have really surprised myself in the new way that I see my time.  I hope it carries through once I come home.

That´s all for today!  ¡Tenga un buen día!  Have a good day!

Adjusting to life in Monte Sinaí

Hello Friends/Family/Members of the RdC Community!!

Hi!  It´s been a hectic first month or so, but my fellow volunteers and I are finally settling into the routine of life here, our worksites, and the larger community.  I´m finally starting to feel really at home here, and I´m meeting new people every day.  I was pretty sick this past week with a nasty case of strep that kept me home basically all week, but I went to the doctor last Monday and have been taking medication and I´m proud to say that I am at 96% and charging. 

For this blog I´m going to try my best to describe the completely different world that I have become a part of.  I´m going to start by describing the volunteer organization that I´m working for, the community that I´m living in, and the work that I´m doing.  I hope it isn´t too much like an essay, I´ll be sure to include more stories and fun stuff (and hopefully pictures) in my next post :)

So... the volunteer program that I´m participating in is called Rostro de Cristo (Face of Christ).  It has sites in the neighborhoods of El Arbolito in Durán, Ecuador, and in Monte Sinaí in Guayaquil, Ecuador (which is where I am).  It was founded by Fr. Jim Ronan in 1988.

The goal of the program is to be with the people of Ecuador and work with them in order to both see the face of Christ in them and be the face of Christ in their lives.  We do volunteer work in schools and nonprofits, but our main work is to build relationships with our neighbors and be present in accompanying the community in their lives.  We live by 5 pillars: Spirituality, Service, Community, Simplicity, and Hospitality.

Rostro de Cristo has two main programs: a year-long volunteer program (what I´m doing), and a short term immersion retreat program which is led by the year-long volunteers.  Throughout the year, we will host a number of groups from high schools and colleges in the U.S.  I will be the volunteer leader for two of the groups that come to Monte Sinaí (the first one is in November). 

The neighborhood that I´m living in, Monte Sinaí, is an invasion community on the north side of Guayaquil which has only been around for about seven years.  It began when a private land owner named Marco Solis began selling plots of his land, which was supposed to be for agriculture, to families who wanted to live near the city.  However, the government doesn´t consider the land legal for habitation, so even though the people living here bought their land from Solis and have documentation to prove it, they are considered to be living on it illegally in the government´s eyes.  Some of my community mates work in a nonprofit called Hogar de Cristo in the community organizing office, which helps people from the community start up groups with the goal of trying to legalize their land. 

There are an estimated 50,000 people living in Monte Sinaí.

This neighborhood is definitely in the early stages of development: very few of the roads are paved, and many families are living in temporary cane houses until they can afford to build brick houses.  The main street near my house has a lot of small shops and businesses, including bakeries, barber shops, video stores, and cybers.  They are run by people who live right here in Monte Sinaí, and we do all of our grocery shopping right here so we can support our neighbors.

My primary work placement is a school called San Felipe Neri, which is just a few blocks away from my house.  It is run by a small community of Columbian nuns from the order of San Felipe Neri: Madre Luceli, Madre Mayra, and Sofía the novice (who´s actually from Perú).  It was only started in 2009 and it has been growing steadily each year.  I am teaching English to the 2nd-5th grade classes- each section has two classes with me a week.  The kids are super sweet and I get about a hundred hugs a day.  When I´m not teaching English or lesson planning, I am hanging out with kids before and after school and during recess, often reading books to them.  Most days after school, Greg (my community mate who is teaching computer classes at San Felipe) and I stay for lunch with the Madres, which is wonderful.  They are really sweet and funny women, and they put so much hard work into bringing good education to the kids of this developing community in Ecuador. 

As a community of Rostro de  Cristo in Monte Sinaí, our second placement is being involved in the parish community, which is called Parroquia Bautismo de Jesús.  It has three chapels: Santa Teresa, San Felipe (which is also the school where I work), and Corpus Cristi.  The priest in charge of the parish, Padre John, is from Ireland (although he is currently traveling).  He´s really great and very dedicated to this community.  It´s definitely very interesting to hear mass in Spanish with a very strong Irish brogue. 

A lot of our involvement has been going to rosary and youth group events, which is a lot of fun.  I´ve also gotten involved with the music ministry a bit.  A lot of the kids from youth group play instruments or sing at mass, and I´ve really enjoyed learning the music they sing at mass.  So far I´ve sung at two masses, and it´s gone surprisingly well.

That´s about all for today.  Hopefully it gives you a pretty good idea of where I am and what I´m doing.  If you want to talk to me, feel free to email me at heschleif@gmail.com.  I check my email a few times a week and I´d love to hear from you.

I thought I´d end with a comparison list because I really like lists for some weird reason.

Things that are hard to get used to:

• Roosters crowing, dogs barking, music playing, etc.- all night long
• Cold showers
• Not having conveniences like a dishwasher, microwave, computer/internet in the house, having my own phone, etc.
• Dust and dirt everywhere
• Ecua-time (it´s totally acceptable to show up to something a half hour or more late to something)
• Wearing the same polo shirt every day

Things that are easy to get used to:

• Welcoming and friendly neighbors
• Veggies and fruit bought fresh for every meal
• Having a dog for the first time!  We have a guard dog named Clubber- he´s a rottweiler- and he´s super sweet.
• The fun music at mass (Fun fact- a lot of their songs use the tunes of songs I already knew, such as the Battle Hymn of the Republic.  My favorite is the tune for the Our Father which they sing every week: The Sound of Silence by Simon and Garfunkel)
• The view of the mountains in the distance as I walk to San Felipe every morning
• Kids everywhere always giving me hugs!
• Everyone is always listening to awesome, random retro music (pretty much everyone loves Michael Jackson)
• Empanadas, chifles, patacones, and many other fun Ecuadorian foods

¡Ciao!  ¡Que se vaya bien!

¡He llegado en Ecuador!

¡He llegado en Ecuador!  I have arrived in Ecuador!

Hi everyone!  I don´t have a ton of time, but I just wanted to post quickly to say that I´ve been here in Ecuador for over a week now and everything is going great so far!  We will finalize our work placements either today or tomorrow, and I´ll tell you all about that after I´ve started working.  Right now, we´re living in the retreat house next to the volunteer house, and we´ll be moving in to the volunteer house after the old volunteers move out at the end of this week.

It´s definitely a different world down here!  The neighborhood where I´m living, Monte Sinai, is an invasion community on the outskirts of Guayaquil that just sprung up in the last ten years or so.  It´s still developing a lot, and many people are living in cane houses up on stilts so they don´t wash away during the rainy season.  We´ve spent quite a bit of time so far going around and meeting neighbors with the old volunteers.  They´ve been really welcoming and it´s cool to see what wonderful relationships they´ve built with the volunteers.  

I´m really excited to get involved in the music ministry and youth group at our parish.  We´ve been to youth group a few times already and went to all three of the masses this weekend, and the kids that show up are really great and got really close with the volunteers from last year.  It should be really fun to get to know them!!

I haven´t been able to take many pictures yet, but here´s one of my community that I´ll be living with for the next year!  This was taken in Boston outside the chapel at Boston College.  From left to right there´s Greg, Colleen, Jimmy, Ana, Mike, and me.  They´re really cool!  We´ve had a great time getting to know each other so far, and it should be a fun year with them.

That´s all I have for now, but hopefully I´ll be able to post again soon.  I just wanted to let everyone know that everything´s going well!!

Heidi